Mittwoch, Januar 27, 2010

The Bangkok Vacation Part

This is the second part of my Asia vacation report. Check the first part here.

Uneventful but very nice flight with Thai. We had gotten so used to Chinese conformity that seeing the differently colored uniforms of the staff was a ray of sunshine, and they were all so friendly. Wonderful.


Arrival

We had been warned about taxi drivers trying to earn an extra dime (or ten) by not activating their taximeter (in other cultures, this is called "ripping off" but most Thai are so poor that this behavior is even understandable) but having just arrived at the airport, I didn't know what to watch out for. How were we supposed to recognize "the good taxis"? Well, we took a taxi to our hotel anyway, and ended up paying a fair price of around 450 Baht, including fees for tollways, which is 9 Euros and cheap for a 45-minute trip at least.

Still, during our vacation weran into many taxi drivers trying to give us a flat fee for taking us instead of driving by taximeter. When that happens, the offered amount is always higher than the taximeter amount. Always. Anyhow, sometimes it would take three or four attempts to find a "proper" taxi driver. Believe me, especially when even the English-speaking ones hardly say a word you understand, things can get exhausting.

We arrived at our hotel, the Khaosan Palace Inn, at around 7 PM. It was right in the middle of Khao San Road, the center of Bangkok backpacker tourism. It was almost 30°C even when we got to the hotel, and much more humid than Hong Kong had been. Tons of people on street, mostly foreigners and street vendors. The hotel was nice, rooms clean and with all the amenities you could expect for roughly 14 Euros per night (for both of us). But once more we first got a room with rather a wall than a view but when we asked to get another one the next morning it was not a problem.




 

The Language Barrier

It felt very good to be staying among foreigners, I can tell you. Not that we wanted to hang out with Germans; it was rather the being among others who were not from there. Just seeing the occasional Caucasian face made me feel much more at home, and I am not exactly proud of this. German history and all. But what aggravated it was the fact that the Thai speak even much worse English than the Chinese I had seen, and had a much worse accent. Consonants were almost omitted altogether, let alone the unbelievable intonation. Not even the sounds we're so used to in English and German are the same. What comes so natural to us when we say "uh-huh", for example, to me sounds more like moaning in Thai. We soon knew how to say "thank you" and stuff like that, but Thai is a different language world altogether.


General Perception of Bangkok

We experienced Bangkok to be colorful and peaceful. Not quite as clean as Hong Kong but still a nice city to be in, as long as you stayed away from downtown that looked pretty much the same as Hong Kong, or any huge-city downtown, for that matter. I think that also Bangkok as a city can be done in three days. It is way easier in Bangkok than in Hong Kong, however, to fill some days. Just make sure you have plan of what to do, even if it explicitly includes hanging out at a spa or pool.


The Wats

The city is full of monasteries (they're called "Wat" in Thai), and one that you should definitely check out is Wat Pho, South of the royal palace. Wat Pho is not only extremely beautiful and impressive, it also gives home to a very accredited massage school where you can get a Thai massage that you will probably never forget.


In case you have never received a Thai massage, be ready for a healthy amount of pain. The boys and girls that gave us one drilled their fingers and elbows into our muscles, and at several points I wanted to ask my masseur to ease up a little. I ultimately didn't, and you feel unbelievable once the massage is over. Promised. Oh, and don't be surprised that when you ask for a Thai full-body massage at Wat Pho, somebody leads you quite far, even out of the monastery into a side street. That's where the massage school is really located. It seems like the small Wat Pho building they have is just a prestige outpost.



If you're gay you have very probably heard of it. It is said to be the best, most luxurious, most famous or whatever gay sauna in the world, and friends of mine had highly recommended it to me. It is very close to the Austrian embassy, by the way. Makes you think, doesn't it? :)

Anyway, Babylon is actually a hotel, sauna and restaurant, and although it hardly met my expectations after all the praising I had heard, it is far from bad. We were given a tour by what I would call the queeniest person ever caught stuck in a man's body, and the hotel rooms are, although relatively expensive for Thailand, still affordable and very nicely set up and decorated. If you love gardens and exotic flowers, the more upscale and private rooms are very likely just your thing. We were told, by the way, that you were obviously welcome to bring guests home but that you were preferred not to bring street hookers. Not in these words, of course, but still.


Bargains

A word about how you can shop yourself to silliness. If you're looking for tailor-made clothes, e.g. suits, Thailand is definitely a place to get them at incredible rates. Not that I had anything made myself but the way street vendors offer these services, there must be something to it. It won't be Armani, as everybody guarantees you it'll be (I wonder if they have any idea what that word means) but I think it's safe to assume that the tailors will do a great job at tailoring pretty much anything to anyone's needs. Including Cirque du Soleil-like tents for the obese.

You get tons of food on the streets, and most of it is not only fine, it's great. If you like Thai food you will love the pad thai that you get almost everywhere. It tastes great and costs around 60 Baht, which is around 1.20 EUR. Try getting a full meal for that price in Germany. Or even just a starter.

Oh, by the way, if you're thinking about buying computer accessories or gaming consoles in Asia, I can't say I recommed it. In Hong Kong, the prices for the stuff you'll want are comparable to German prices so even dealing with the country limitations -- as far as they still exist -- isn't worth it, and in Bangkok it's actually almost the same. Facing the fact that you probably won't have any guarantee on your product, I'd say you leave it and order it somewhere cheap in Germany.


My Bangkok 101

Here's my Bangkok 101 so YOU get something out of all this as well:
  1. Transportation and taxi: Taking a taxi is so cheap that unless you have a specific reason to do differently, you should rely on taxis. You can try taking a tuktuk just to see how boring and expensive it is, and how you'll be too tall to actually see anything. Just make sure that the taxi driver activates his taximeter, and you'll be fine. Ask right away whether he'll activate it. If he won't, he'll tell you a lump-sum price or just drive off without any comment. If he understands where you want to go and says "OK", you're fine to get in.
    What might help you is getting a card (some hotels have them) with all the touristy destinations written on them in English and Thai so that all you have to do is pointing at one.
  2. Hotel room: Admittedly, this is rather a general hint than Bangkok-related but in my experience it has always paid off to ask for another room when I didn't like mine. Sometimes a different room costs extra but often the fee is way worth it if in exchange you get one you actually enjoy.
  3. Street vendors: Unless you actually want to buy something, avoid eye contact and ignore them altogether. Personally, I have a hard time with that, especially because the Thai are extremely friendly. Of course this is exactly what vendors look out for, and some of them stick to you, no matter what you say and no matter how you're trying to say nicely that you'd prefer to be left alone. American politeness doesn't work here; forget it.
  4. Diarrhoea and stuff: Don't drink tap water. Brushing your teeth is fine though. Food in restaurants is generally fine to eat, and so is most food sold on the streets. If you're likely to have digestive problems, you should watch out for refridgerated stuff like ice cream, milk shakes, and ice cubes.
  5. The voltage in Thailand is 220 volts, and the German plugs fit, so you're fine with gadgets from Germany but check twice whether your American apparel works. Electrical shavers and notebooks are usually fine but, e.g., battery chargers often don't.
Thanks for reading this brief but hopefully informative report. The pictures are already online. Ask me for access codes if you're interested.

It's good to be back (although I admit we have been back for almost a month now).

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